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with a shrug and then proceeded to tick off an impressive list of European hospitals where she had received training in addition to her degree from the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania.
    When she finished, the man stared at her in red-faced silence. With his double chins quivering beneath his luxuriant graying whiskers and his mouth working like that of a grounded carp, he was the very picture of outraged dignity.
    Regaining his composure with admirable speed, the doctor cleared his throat several times before replying with galling condescension, “That all sounds very well and good, but everyone knows that females are incapable of retaining knowledge for any reasonable length of time. I’m afraid, my dear, that your poor parents threw their money away. Better they had spent it on a dowry instead.” With a nasty smile, he added, “Even the most undesirable of females is rendered desirable in the presence of a large marriage portion.”
    â€œYes. But only to undesirable males,” Hallie replied flippantly as she tried to pull Serena toward the bed. As if she didn’t have enough problems already, the woman had decided that she was having none of Hallie’s coaxing and refused to budge from her crouched position on the floor.
    With a sigh, Hallie decided to try to reason with her. “Now Serena—”
    â€œHurts!” wailed Serena as another contraction rocked her body.
    Hallie made some quick calculations. Gauging from her last examination of her patient, the birth was critically near. Damn it! She had to find some way to get rid of these men. Only then would she have any hope of delivering the child successfully.
    â€œDear God!” exclaimed Dr. Barnes when yet another cry was wrenched from Serena. “I’ve wasted enough valuable time trying to reason with this irrational female. Claude! Benedict! I want Mrs. Parrish bound to that bed! Now!” he ordered, and the three of them advanced on the women.
    Hallie leaped into action. Wildly she swung the broom, first catching Claude in the back of the head with a blow that brought him to his knees, and then backhanding Dr. Barnes in his considerable belly, making him double up with pain. Defensively, she spun around to face the apprentice, Benedict, but it was too late.
    With an agility Hallie hadn’t counted on, he easily caught hold of the flailing broom and wrenched it out of her hands. Tossing the weapon aside, he pulled her into an immobilizing grip that made her fight for breath.
    â€œStop that! Can’t you see she’s terrified?” demanded Hallie as Dr. Barnes and Claude dragged the screaming Serena to the bed. They wrestled with her roughly, trying to still her arms long enough to bind them.
    â€œYou promised!” cried Serena, frantically struggling against the restraining strength of the two men. “You promised you wouldn’t let them touch me! You promised! You promised!” The desperation of the words tore at Hallie’s heart, spurring her to renew her battle with a vengeance. Twisting and pulling until she gained enough distance from her captor to move her legs, she called forth all of her waning strength to give him one sharp kick. As the pointed toe of her boot made bruising contact with his shin, Benedict let out a yowl loud enough to drown out Serena’s hysterical shrieks. Instantly, his arms dropped from Hallie’s waist and he slithered to the floor, clutching at his leg.
    Satisfied that her captor was preoccupied with nursing his abused limb, Hallie lunged into the fray at the bed.
    â€œLooks like a scene from bedlam, doesn’t it?” Seth observed, viewing the altercation from the doorway. “Oh, good left on that lady!” he added with admiration as Hallie landed a punch squarely against Claude’s chin and effectively eliminated him from the tussle.
    As Jake joined his friend on the threshold and stared aghast at the chaos in the room,